Lost Souls. Lisa Jackson

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СКАЧАТЬ of dirt on the back porch where an ancient washing machine had become the home to a nest of hornets. The rusted washer along with its legion of dead wasps was now gone, terra cotta pots of trailing plants in its stead on the newly painted floorboards.

      But he was far from finished. It would take months to get the house into shape. He dropped his bags in the small bedroom, then walked to the kitchen, where an ancient refrigerator was wheezing on cracked linoleum he had yet to replace. Inside the fridge, along with some cheese that had dried and cracked, he discovered a six pack of Lone Star that was only one bottle shy, and grabbed a long neck. It was strange, he thought, how Baton Rouge, of all places, had become his haven away from New Orleans, the city where he’d worked and grown up.

      Had it been the aftermath of Katrina that had drawn the lifeblood from him? The crime lab on Tulane Avenue had been destroyed by the storm and the work the lab did scattered to different parishes and private agencies as well as to the Louisiana State Police crime lab in Baton Rouge. Sometimes they worked in FEMA trailers. It had been a nightmare—the extra hours, the frustration of evidence that had been collected, only to end up being compromised. And then there was the volunteer time spent helping with victims of the storm, as well as the cleanup after the floodwaters receded. He doubted few people on the police force hadn’t thought about quitting, and a lot had, leaving the force understaffed in a time when it needed more dedicated officers, not less.

      Not that Jay blamed anyone for leaving. Not only were they helping victims of the hurricane, many officers, too, were dealing with the loss of their own homes and loved ones.

      He, too, needed a change. It wasn’t just the horrendous hours he’d worked. Witnessing the horror of the hurricane and watching the city struggle to recover while the Feds pointed fingers at each other was bad enough. But then knowing that so much evidence, painfully collected over the years, had literally been washed away—that had settled on him like a weight. So much waste. So much to do to bring things back.

      At thirty, he was already jaded.

      And something—some last piece of tragedy—had sent him on this journey away from New Orleans.

      Had it been the looters—those who were desperate or criminal enough to take advantage of the tragedy?

      The victims trapped in their own homes, or nursing homes?

      The lack of a quick response by the federal government?

      The near-death of a city he loved?

      Or was it the fact that his own home had been totaled by the screaming wind and flood that had torn his rented cottage from its foundation, ruining nearly everything he’d owned?

      And how much of the disaster could he blame for his ill-fated romance with Gayle? Had the demise of their relationship been his fault? Hers? The situation?

      He gave the dog fresh water in an old saucepan, then opened his beer. As he took a long swallow from the long neck, he stared through the grimy, rain-spattered window to the backyard. Through the panes he saw a bat swoop near the branches of a solitary magnolia tree. Dusk was falling rapidly, a reminder he had work to do.

      Twisting his head, he heard his vertebrae crack and adjust as he walked to the second bedroom—still painted a nauseating shade of pink—where he’d set up a desk, lamp, and small file cabinet. A dog bed was in the corner and Bruno found an old half-chewed rawhide “bone” and started working on it. Jay took another swallow of his Lone Star, then set the beer down. He opened his notebook computer and set it on the chipped Formica desktop before hitting the power button. With a whirr, the PC started and images appeared. Seconds later he was on the Internet, eyeballing his e-mail.

      Imbedded in the spam and mail from coworkers and friends was another note from Gayle. His gut clenched a bit as he opened the missive, read her quick little cheery e-note, and found no humor in the joke she’d forwarded to him. No big surprise. They’d agreed to be civil to each other, remain friends, but who was kidding whom? It wasn’t working. Their relationship was dead. Had been dying long before the storm hit.

      He didn’t respond. It was as pointless as the diamond ring that sat in his bureau drawer in New Orleans. His lips twisted at that. He hadn’t had much luck in the ring department. Years before he’d given a “promise ring” to his high school sweetheart, and Kristi Bentz had promptly gotten involved with a TA when she’d gone off to school up here, at All Saints College. How about that for a bit of irony? Years later, when he’d finally offered a ring to Gayle, she’d accepted the diamond and begun to plan their life together—his life—to the point that he’d felt as if a noose had been draped over his neck. With each passing day the rope drew tighter until he hadn’t been able to breathe. His attitude had rankled Gayle, and she’d become all the more possessive. She’d called him at all hours of the night, had become jealous of his friends, his coworkers, even his damned career. And she’d never let him forget that he’d wanted to marry Kristi Bentz long before he’d met her. Gayle had been certain he’d never stopped pining for his high school sweetheart.

      Which was just damned stupid.

      So he’d asked for his ring back.

      And had it hurled at his forehead, where it had cut his skin and left a small scar just over his left eyebrow, evidence of Gayle’s fury.

      He figured he’d ducked a bigger missile when he’d called off the wedding.

      So much for true love.

      Grabbing the remote for the small television balanced upon the filing cabinet, he skimmed through his e-mail. Half listening to the news as he waited for a sports report and an update on the Saints, he’d started reading through a dozen other pieces of e-mail when he caught the end of a news report on the television.

      “…missing from the campus of All Saints College since before Christmas, the coed was last seen here, in Cramer Hall, by her roommate on December eighteenth around four-thirty.”

      Jay swung all of his attention to the screen, where a female reporter in a blue parka, battling wind and rain in a threatening sky, was staring into the camera. The report had been taped in front of the brick edifice of the dorm in which Kristi Bentz had lived years ago as a freshman. An image of Kristi as she was then, with her long, auburn hair, athletic body, and deep set, intelligent eyes, sizzled through his brain. He’d been stupid about her back then, certain she was “the one.” Of course since that time, he’d learned how wrong he’d been. Thankfully she’d broken it off, and he’d avoided a marriage that would’ve certainly ended up a trap for both of them. Talk about a screwed up family!

      “…Since that day, a week before Christmas,” the reporter was saying, “no one has seen Rylee Ames alive.” A picture of the twenty-ish girl flashed onto the screen. With blue eyes, streaked, blond hair, and a bright smile, Rylee Ames looked like the quintessential “California girl,” a cheerleader type, though the reporter was saying that she’d attended high school in Tempe, Arizona, and Laredo, Texas.

      “This is Belinda Del Rey, reporting for WMTA, in Baton Rouge.”

      Rylee Ames. The name sounded familiar.

      Bothered, Jay quickly logged onto the college’s Web site and checked his class list, one that was updated as students added or dropped classes from their schedules. The first name on his roster was Ames, Rylee.

      His cop radar was on full alert and he had to slow his mind from reeling onto one horrifying scenario after another. Rape, torture, murder—he’d seen so many violent crimes, but he tried not to leap to any conclusions, not yet. There СКАЧАТЬ